Heroic Deed
by Twirl
Summary: The death and last deed of Mr. Universe. One shot.


_I'm dead._

Strange. The first thing that popped into his mind wasn't witty, didn't constitute a joke, didn't flatter his own abilities, nor did it add on to or interrupt anyone's thoughts. It was just a simple statement of the facts at hand.

The dying man forced his eyes open--every conscious movement hurt to some degree. They were gone. The Alliance men were gone. Vaguely, he remembered drifting in and out of consciousness. The men had been moving around, but he hadn't been able to see or process what they were doing…

If Mr. Universe had more strength, he would have jerked to his feet. "No…" He rasped, thought chapped lips.

His equipment… All of it… Unusable…

Utterly useless. So that's what they'd been doing…

Mr. Universe couldn't help but give a grudging half-grin of respect. The Alliance man… The-the Operative knew what he was doing.

Mr. Universe knew he had to relax. He stood more of a chance of surviving if he concentrated only on breathing. The wound was bad, he knew that much.

Surviving for what, though?

Mal'd be coming, with his crew, but the Alliance knew that, right?

_Call in every ship in the quadrant, we'll meet them in the air. _

Why he remembered that now, Mr. Universe didn't know. But if the Alliance was trying to trap Mal in-between their fleet and the ion cloud, they'd be in for one hell of a fight. Wash was one hell of a pilot, and if anyone could get through the Alliance blockade, the Hawaiian shirt wearing, and dinosaur-playing man could. And Mal would no doubt have a heroic and dangerous plan. Yes, Mal would get through.

But they'd get through, and find Mr. Universe dead or dying, his equipment almost completely destroyed.

It was a no-win situation for Mal, as much as Mr. Universe hated to admit it. Poor bastard. It really sounded like Mal had found himself a real noble cause…

Pain shot through his body as he jerked as upright as he could. Did he…?

Mr. Universe turned his head, looking partially down a narrow hallway.

No debris, nothing seemed disturbed. And he could still faintly hear the generators churning. They missed his backup system!

Before his conscious mind could keep up with his subconscious, Mr. Universe had pushed himself from the chair, landing with a painful thud on the floor. Mal'd get through, he knew. But when Mal got through, he'd find a dead Mr. Universe, or one in no condition to talk. He couldn't take the chance he'd survive 'till then.

Even if it cost him his already fading life, he had to tell Mal about the backup system.

He lifted his head a few painful centimeters. Yes! Lenore sat undisturbed, staring off into space, smiling at nothing. The short distance to her seemed like miles, but that didn't matter as long as she was _there_.

Mr. Universe stretched out, pressing his palms against the cold floor. With a grunt of effort and pain, he pulled himself forwards maybe a foot. His lips formed into a small smile at this small accomplishment.

He stretched out again, pulling himself forwards. Mr. Universe was beginning to grow light headed. But he kept moving, finding it easier to let his mind wander and let his subconscious take over moving his body.

Mr. Universe had never bought into the whole "life flashes before your eyes" crap. Something some creative writer thought up for the charade people called viewing entertainment. The very devices they were watched and monitored through. Not Mr. Universe, though, he noted with a sense of satisfaction. He put all his monitors together himself. There was no way the Alliance could track him through them. Through Serenity's, sure. But not _his._

Mr. Universe was proud to say he was anything but ordinary.

And now, he was almost expecting his short-lived life to flash before his eyes. How old was he? Thirty? Thirty-eight? He certainly wasn't younger than thirty, nor over forty. Somewhere along the countless screens, keystrokes, and digital information, Mr. Universe forgotten his humanity. Now he was expecting some sort of reprimand. One more trial to endure. Like God was summarizing a lifetime into seconds, making a final judgment before damning him to hell or… damning him to bliss. Deciding if anything out of the many things not done in his life were enough to keep Mr. Universe alive. Like the annoying trivia game host, taunting the people of the Alliance with his supreme power, "Is that your final answer?"

Mr. Universe groaned, reaching up and grasping the couch above. "No, please dear, don't get up." He somehow managed to rasp coherently. What had Mal called it? Staying alive by witty banter? Well, it wasn't banter, nor was it witty, but it would do for now.

Lenore didn't move, nor would she until she was activated, either by remote or by the switch on the back of her neck. He pulled himself one to the couch, sitting upright with the exception of the hand in a white knuckled grasp of Lenore's unbreakable arm.

For the first time, his conscious mind fully registered the stab wound. He looked down at it, curious. He'd have died long before Mal got there, most defiantly. Nice… It was a clean cut, perfectly inserted and withdrawn within the same line. The assassin wasn't a slacker, Mr. Universe would give him that much.

With his free hand, Mr. Universe reached over to flip the switch behind Lenore's neck, and hit one small button in particular.

"Recording." Came a beautiful soothing female voice, a voice Mr. Universe had come so accustomed to.

"Mal," Mr. Universe forced his voice to be strong. Lenore would convert his voice into her own sweet one, he knew. But if his voice faltered at all, Lenore's voice would reflect it. The feature he once used to record sweet and sexy nothings for Lenore to repeat to him was now going to help Mal broadcast his message.

How weird was that?

"Guy killed me, Mal. He killed me with a sword." Werid. He didn't fear his imminent death. Not to say he was embracing it, or enthralled by it, but it didn't scare him as much as he thought it would. "How werid is that?" Yes, that statement seemed to sum up the situation.

A wave of nausea swept over him. He shut his eyes tightly, but couldn't keep the weakness from his voice, "I… got… a shot span.. here."

It suddenly became too much to sit mostly on his own. He slumped against Lenore, face turned upwards towards her face. Automatically, her programming kicked in, and she wrapped her arms around him, rubbing his back gently. He forced his weary and weakening body to draw strength from this.

"They destroyed my equipment, but I have a backup until, bottom of the complex, right over the generator. Hard to get to… I know they missed it." Hard to get to? That was an understatement, and he knew it. The bridge was programmed from his destroyed station and from the one on the other side. Mal would have one hell of a climb. Once again, Mr. Universe's paranoia had saved the day.

"They can't stop the signal." He said, with renewed vigor, opening his eyes. The renewed vigor lasted all of three seconds, and all the strength left his body. He slumped slowly down, his head landing on Lenore's lap. He rasped one last thing before his heart gave out,

"They can never stop... the signal..."

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**Mr. Universe, Lenore and no part of the Firefly 'verse belongs to me. Do you have any idea how many times while writting this that I wanted to shorten his name? Interesting note: I didn't use any Chinese, not because I don't know the translations of swear words, but because I figured Mr. Universe would be above using the "universal language" as mandated by the Alliance.  
**


End file.
